The Ecstasy of the Rose
by Mercurie
Summary: Ruby isn't like other demons. Anna travels to her past to find out why, only to become an inextricable part of her life. Anna/Ruby.


**Title: **The Ecstasy of the Rose

**Written for: **paperflowered for spn_fs_exchange

**Rating:** PG-13

**Warnings:** canonical character death

**Summary:** Ruby isn't like other demons. Anna travels to her past to find out why, only to become an inextricable part of her life.

**Notes:** Thank you to scintilla10 and cantarina1 on LJ for betaing!

***

_This isn't the beginning. It's only my beginning. You'll understand when we get to the end._

***

Once she got over the shock, Ruby thought about killing her. It would be simple. The girl was a shrinking child—familiar old eyes, but none of the fierce strength that she remembered. She thought she remembered. It was too long ago to be more than a shadow.

She remembered Anna like she used to be, how she had once burned with power. Maybe that was how she had really been, then. Ruby didn't want to look closely at those memories; it was better not to know whether it was true or whether she had only seen things the way she had wanted to see them. It was better to believe that everything she'd done had been for something greater than the girl in front of her.

The Anna of now sat complacently in the cabin and stared at her and made her feel ashamed. She schooled her face to show nothing of her feelings and she was not sorry for showing nothing, but she was sorry and ashamed that once she had loved this creature. It was the shame that made her want to kill Anna.

"It's funny how different you are," Anna said. She smiled with her clear and open eyes. "I think I'm getting used to it." But she still kept a careful distance between them and it hurt even worse than the irony of the words. Nothing should hurt anymore after an eternity of Hell. All those weaknesses should have been burned away along with her memories.

"You're ahead of the curve," Ruby said, slightly mocking. "Nobody else seems to have caught on to that yet."

"They will," Anna said. "I'm sure of it."

Ruby shrugged and snorted and turned away. She didn't want to think about being different. She wanted to keep a grip on herself. No killing anyone, no telling anyone anything, not yet. She couldn't think of anything to say or do that would have any point.

She wished she could've forgotten, like everyone else in Hell. Angels were hard to forget.

She heard Anna move, soft slow steps ghosting across the floor. She tensed and tensed; she thought her spine was going to snap. Anna didn't touch her, just stood close enough that Ruby imagined she could feel the heat of that human body against her own cold skin. Cold skin covering dead, borrowed flesh and Anna could see right through all of it to her true face. Just like always, it terrified her.

"What's it like?" Anna asked.

"What?"

"What's it like to be … a demon? Why aren't you like the others?"

Ruby would have laughed in another life. Would have said, how dare you ask me, do you know who you are to ask that? Would have grabbed her hands and trapped them and made sure it hurt and said, let me show you what a demon is. But she was no longer impetuous. She was no longer what she had been.

She gave Anna a slanted glance over her shoulder. "You're gonna find out someday, kiddo. You could even say you already have."

Anna laughed a little, nervous. "Okay, that was … mysterious."

Ruby smiled as sweetly as she knew how and leaned in close, watching Anna's eyes widen because oh, that hideous demon face, and said, "Just remember. It was your fault."

***

_She wouldn't tell me what that meant. I was too afraid to keep asking, then. Her face frightened me. It feels strange, now, remembering how I feared a mere demon. Then everything else happened and I realized, she knew all along. She knew I was an angel. It seemed like she knew me._

_I had to disappear for a while. Heaven couldn't simply let me go, they sent two of my brothers after me—all Castiel's fault, you shouldn't trust him. It's hard for an angel to hide from other angels, so I decided to vanish into the past, far enough back that it would harm them to travel so far. Then I had the idea that I would take on my human form again and see her, before she became a demon. I couldn't forget what she'd said to me._

_It's not difficult to locate a person, but I didn't know what I was looking for. I had to let the feel of her lead me, like following someone who's carrying a lantern ahead of you on a moonless night. It's easier to find important moments in a person's life. They shine more brightly._

_I found her in Italy, in the 14th century. That wasn't surprising. It was a bad century._

***

Blood filled her mouth. Through tear-blurred eyes she could see the first streaks of dawn. In confusion, she thought the sun was like her pain and they were both waxing, raising their inexorable heads. She would be burned to nothing by them. The sun inside her, searing; pain bright enough to light up the world.

She'd never thought how terrible dying would be. She wished she could stop crying so she could see clearly. It was the last time, she thought, that she would ever see the sun and trees and earth of her home. Even through the pain she could feel the mild Tuscan air gentle on her skin. She tried to cling to each passing moment because she knew at the end of her death Hell was waiting for her. This present terror and anguish would be a fond memory there.

She wished wildly that she could undo everything; if only she could go back, it had all been a mistake, she'd been so foolish. Nothing could be worth it, what she knew was coming. Fear choked her and she struggled to breathe. The rising darkness of panic loomed and she thought, I am like a beast fleeing from the horns, it's all over, the hounds are nearly upon me, oh God why did I forsake you, oh God somebody help me, help me, help.

She heard someone say, "Ruby." A strange noise came out of her throat. Maybe it would have been laughter, if it hadn't passed through a gauntlet of blood and tears and pain. Of course she would be here for this. For the last time and the first time.

Gentle hands turned her over. The face peering down was the one she had loved and thought she had killed.

"You've been stabbed," Anna said, frowning but calm. "I can't seem to heal it." The pale morning light shone on her face, lightly troubled. She wasn't weeping and Ruby knew she only cared in an abstract way, if at all. Somehow that was worse than anything, even though later, yes, Anna would care. Oh yes, she would feel every bit of that bitterness.

But now they were strangers again. She had been betrayed by her only friend and she was dying in the arms of a stranger.

"What happened?" Anna placed a hand on the side of her face. She hated herself for loving the touch. "There's something strange about the wound. It's resisting me."

"Too late," Ruby whispered. Anna bent down to hear. Her hair fell like a curtain around her face. "Hell has claimed me," Ruby said.

"No, I'm—I should be able to stop it."

"Even angels," Ruby gasped. The blood ran hot out of her mouth. It was growing dark. The sun was rising but she could see the darkness coming down on her. "Even angels have limits to their knowledge."

The hand on her face stilled. "How do you know?" Anna said. "How do you know what I am?"

The hounds were baying, closer, closer. She was no longer crying and the day was nearly black.

"This is only the beginning," she said. "You have so far to go."

Then the pain faded and everything else faded too and she said, "Anna, Anna, Anna," repeating the word like a talisman until Hell received her.

***

_It was witchcraft. Some powerful magic, backed by Hell. It was strange to see her so human, only beginning the suffering that made her into the Ruby I had met. I might have been able to save her, but not without letting every angel within four thousand years know where I was. At the time, that didn't seem like an option._

_I was sorry later._

_Of course I didn't leave it at that. I was curious. She already knew me, which meant we must have met in her past. So I followed the thread of her life back until I found another knot, a place that drew me in as if I belonged there._

_She was never, ever what I expected._

***

She heard Anna arrive and she closed the book on the altar. Sunlight slanted through the window in the apse, warming the plain walls of the Badia, but she shivered in that familiar presence. She turned.

"You're a nun," Anna said, surprised. She was wearing her strange clothes. Trousers like a man, everything indecently tight. Not how the Church said an angel should look, and oh, all the sisters and brothers in their holy orders would be so very surprised to learn what angels were really like.

But she had a stillness to her, as if she were filled with light and a clumsy move might spill it. The church grew quiet, holding its breath in wonder.

Ruby—she always became Ruby when Anna was there—didn't move closer. She didn't do that anymore. But she let her eyes linger. That much she could allow herself.

"But why would you…" Anna made a mockery of her restraint and closed the distance between them. "You dedicated yourself to the Father, how could you …?" She trailed off.

"I know you won't say any more," Ruby said. "You never would tell me about my future. Not even to help me." She slid around Anna and sat down in the first pew.

"I wouldn't?" Anna said. "So we've met before."

"Many times," Ruby said. "I've gotten good at seeing you coming. They call me a mystic. Talking to angels." She smiled. "They don't know I'm a witch."

"But why would you become a witch?" Anna said. "If you took holy vows, you must have believed in the glory of God at one time." She paused. "You must realize how terrible Hell is. You should have known better."

"Yes, I should have known better than to worship such a God. And His angels. There are other powers so much more just. The Devil is cruel, but he is also fair and…" She leaned forward in her seat. "He doesn't lie." The words came out louder than she intended, echoing sharply in the church.

She reined in her anger. This wasn't going to be like the last time. She was in control now.

Anna was shaking her head, coming closer as if she couldn't stay away, and that was irritating when all Ruby wanted was to keep enough space around her so she could think.

"You're wrong, Ruby, if you think Lucifer is fair. He'll turn you into—" Anna bit her lip. "It's not too late. I can help you."

Ruby laughed once. "You _liar_," she said. "You lie and lie, everything you say is twisted. Do you think you can still fool me? I know perfectly well that you can't help me, even if you wanted to. You can't even help yourself. You're a fugitive. Heaven has cast you out and the other angels are hunting you this very moment."

That brought Anna up short. "How do you know that?" she said.

"You know my future, I know yours. What a shame we could never help each other."

Anna gazed at her and she remembered how, once, she had fallen into those dark, ancient eyes and thought to find something that transcended the human world and all of its incomprehensible suffering. Where else, but in an angel's eyes? But she had found only… more of the same. Sin and death. She'd decided not to be powerless any longer. Prayer was too unreliable.

"Maybe we still could," Anna said, so very softly it was almost inaudible.

"No. It's much too late, Anna. It's too late for us. Don't think I'm going to let you get away easily, though. It's a good thing you're fast on your feet. Or rather wings."

"I don't know what you mean. There's nothing you could do to me …"

They both looked up at the sound of footsteps. A dark-haired woman in fine clothes walked out of the aisle and into the space before the altar. She was very pale and blood dripped from her hands, but she smiled.

"I heard you speaking, Sister Rosa," she said. "Visions again?" Her eyes strayed to Anna, fascinated.

"They will plague me until my death, I think," Ruby said. "But I'm happy to share one with you before then, Tomasina."

"An Angel of God," Tomasina said. "I never thought I should see one." She raised one red hand and traced a symbol in the air.

"Stop!" Anna said. She backed away and stumbled into the altar, no longer graceful. The Bible fell to the floor.

Tomasina spoke the final word of the summoning and the church shook with the thunder of wings. Ruby cowered in the pew, squeezing her eyes shut and Anna screamed and screamed and the air howled like the merciless winter wind. The noise of it was terrible and if this was the sound of Heaven, then by God, no—not by God—she had done right to choose another master. She was sure the stone of the walls must be splitting, but when an abrupt silence fell and she opened her eyes, not even the windows were harmed. All was as it had been except that Tomasina was on her knees, wide-eyed, and Anna was gone.

"Godspeed," Ruby said.

***

_I ran for my life, two Seraphim close behind. Their anger was terrible—they still hated me for killing Uriel. They would have had me, too. I could feel the ripples of their thoughts through time. They were so close and I was already tired._

_Then something caught me. She caught me the same way she'd caught them. Like pulling a star out of the sky with a spiderweb, she plucked me straight out of their path and back down to murky earth. A moment later and I would have been nothing but dust, scattered through time. Her anger saved my life._

_She was an incredible witch, really._

***

It might not work, Ruby thought, but it would only hurt a little to try. She was more than angry enough to dare it.

She laid her trap by candlelight in her stark cell. The moon shone through the window. It reminded her of another moonlit night, years ago, when the word witchcraft had frightened her. Sometimes it seemed impossible that she and that long-ago girl could be the same person.

Everything she had learned from Donna Tomasina she had learned well and her hands didn't falter as she worked: freeing her hair from its wimple, long and red and wild, turning her back to the full moon so its light made a pool before her, pouring the blessed oil. Then the blood. It was only blood magic that could summon angels, Tomasina had said. They were drawn to it like scavengers. So Tomasina said.

She knelt and cut her arm, letting the blood flow. When enough of it had pooled, she drew the symbols on the floor and spoke the words. The air sighed and then there was Anna, her bright Anna, cool and innocent as if she had never corrupted anyone, never abandoned anyone to suffering, never refused to answer prayers.

"Ruby," she said. She sounded out of breath. "What—?"

Ruby tipped over the candle and the holy fire sprang to life, encircling them both in a burning ring. She stood, feeling light-headed from loss of blood and grinned, a painful stretching of the lips.

"Now," she said. "You go when I say you can go. You stay as long as I want you to. I know you can't break through the fire." She grasped the front of Anna's short jacket. Blood flowed from her aching arm and stained them both.

"Let me go, Ruby," Anna took her wrists gently, though Ruby knew she could break them with a mere twist.

"I will not."

"You have to. Now. There are two angels hunting me and they won't exactly be nice to you either if they find us."

"Is that your excuse? Angels fighting angels?" She pushed her captive, sending her stumbling back against the fire. "Is there a war in Heaven, Anna? Is that why God has abandoned humanity?" Ruby held out one hand, palm out and spoke a word. She reveled in the rush of power when Anna fell forward, sinking to her knees, shock parting her lips.

"You have too much power," Anna said, recovering. "Much more than an ordinary witch. You would have to sell your soul for this."

"Six years is a long time, Anna. I've made other friends."

"Friends worth going to Hell for?"

"What's Hell compared to Earth?"

"It's a lot worse."

"You think? Six years since you've been back here. Things have changed."

"Six…" Anna stared up at her and Ruby didn't want to decipher the look on her face.

"Can you really not know?" Ruby said slowly. "Are God and all His angels so busy they can't spare a moment to look down and see that the Black Death is ravaging us?"

She bared her teeth. The circle of fire seemed to jump higher in time with her anger. "Half of Fiesole has died in the last five years. Half! Paolina—Paolina died! Is that God's mercy? Is He too busy playing favorites in Heaven? Why, Anna? _Why?_ "

And she wanted to cry, why did you help me so many times and then leave me when I really needed you? Is that also God's mercy? But she had her pride and more of it than she used to. She refused to be weak.

"I can't help any of that," Anna said.

Ruby slapped her hard enough to snap her head back. Before Anna could recover, Ruby shoved her down onto the floor and straddled her, wrapping both hands around her neck.

"Yes, you could," she said. "You did it on purpose. You did this to me." She tore at Anna's whorish clothing, pushing up her shirt to expose the familiar fair flesh, grinding down with her hips. Anna's gasp sent a sweet rush of satisfaction coursing through her.

"You made me love you," she said, and bit Anna's lip. But when she looked down at her handiwork, the wound was gone and only a tiny smear of blood remained. It seemed unfair that she could never leave so much as a mark when Anna had shaped her entire being.

"You made me what I am," she said.

"No," Anna whispered. She was breathing hard, at least. "None of that—none of that has happened. Haven't you understood yet? I'm going backwards, Ruby, backwards in time. I don't know what happened to you, I don't know what I did."

Ruby stared down at her. The memory of a white dress flashed through her mind and she looked at Anna's clothes, the same strange indecent clothes she'd been wearing when …

"No," she said. "Why would you do that?"

"There are angels after me, like I said. A rebel faction—well, they consider me a rebel faction. But I've been running from them and they keep driving me backwards. If you haven't seen me for six years, it probably means they were keeping me busy. And since they're close now and you've slowed me down, it could take a long time for me to throw them off track."

She could only think, over and over, no, no, no. Because that would mean Anna hadn't abandoned her. It would mean this was all her fault, because of what she was doing now.

Suddenly, the room felt claustrophobic. Despair rose like bile in her throat, threatening to choke her. She forced it down into a festering ache in the pit of her stomach, chanting to herself: angels lie, angels lie, angels lie. She had enough personal experience to know it to be fact. Now she had enough power to punish one for it.

Ruby pushed herself off Anna and scrambled away, putting as much distance between them as the circle allowed.

"The angels are coming? Let them take you, then," she said. "Let them have you. Maybe it will even change the past."

Anna stood up in one smooth motion. She didn't look afraid at all.

"I'm sorry," she said.

Behind her, where the moonlight fell against the wall, two huge shadows reared up. Ruby had seen them once before and the sight had filled her with the same fear and awe then as it did now. Dark wings, stretching to either side, moving a hair more slowly than they should. Like something in a nightmare.

Ruby took an involuntary step back and her foot landed in the flames. She screamed, not only from the pain, but because now the circle was broken and Anna was free.

The angel had vanished even before Ruby jerked herself out of the fire. She poured water from the basin on the table over the burn, whimpering.

Crouching on her knees, she pressed the heels of her hands against her eyes, willing the whimpers not to turn into sobs. It wasn't over yet. Anna had as good as told her they would meet again. She wanted it to be the last time. And for once, she was going to win.

***

_She couldn't know that I escaped too late. They found me. When angels fight—we don't have physical bodies, we have nothing to fight with when not inhabiting a vessel. So we have to borrow what already exists: a bolt of lightning splitting a cliff face or the wind tearing at the sea. Whenever you see a storm, it could be angels dying._

_I only survived because they had exhausted themselves hunting. I escaped from the storm in a single raindrop and they were too weakened to perceive me._

_But a raindrop couldn't hold me for long. I needed somewhere to recover. I knew from her own words that she would receive me—even love me. In return, I told myself I might save her. I might break the chain of events that had brought her so much pain. I might, for a while, pretend at the humanity Heaven had taken from me, and help Ruby keep hers as well._

_It seemed simple enough to be human again. I'd had so much practice. _

***

Rosa thought, I will die. The words drifted away from her into a hot haze. She thought she was burning, yes, they had set her alight, called her a witch and not suffered her to live. Or no, she was in Hell, cast down into the flames. Hell looked like her cell at the abbey, but the air burned.

The hours rushed by at times and at others they stopped and crawled, inching minute by agonizing minute into a dry future. Her throat ached. People walked in and out of the room at irregular intervals, murmuring. Their hands kept her rooted to the ground; she was so light, she would float away, out the window and up to Heaven without their grasping hands.

She rocked for a while in an airy half-wakefulness and then the nightmares came again: fire, always the fire. She wanted to weep at the pain, but the heat dried her tears before they could fall.

A woman came and laid hands on her. They were soft and cool, soothing the hurt wherever it lingered. The heat faded, it grew dark. She slept.

When Rosa woke, Sister Paolina was sitting at the side of her cot.

"Thank God," she said. "We had thought that you, too, were for the angels."

Rosa could only croak in reply. Paolina held a cup of water to her lips and she gulped it down quickly. She tried again to speak.

"How long …?"

"Nearly seven days," Paolina said. "You were almost gone. The fever has taken so many; we were sure it would take you, too." She shook her head and blinked red-rimmed eyes. "Heaven has some mercy. I am not sure I could have borne losing you, too."

"Someone was here," Rosa said dreamily. "A woman or the shape of a woman. She healed me."

Paolina gave her a long look. "Perhaps you should sleep again. The fever dreams have weakened you."

"Thank you," Rosa said.

"For what? I had nothing to give you except prayer."

"For that, then. And for watching over my sickbed. For giving me a home. For being my friend."

Paolina smiled and kissed her forehead. "Sleep well, child," she said.

When she left, Rosa didn't sleep. She got up from the bed, testing her legs. She didn't feel weak. Her limbs were strong and strangely energetic; she felt an odd urge to dance and quashed it.

There was a small basin of water on the table, the only other furniture in the room. She picked up the rag that lay next to it, dipped it in the basin, let the water roll down over her face. She felt new—reborn.

A soft sound disturbed the stillness. She turned to find Anna.

"It's you," she said, nearly laughing. "I knew it was you. You always save me." She dropped the rag back into the basin. "I know what you are."

"Do you?" Anna said. She looked tired. Her eyes, resting on Rosa's face, seemed muted, a veil drawn over their power. Still, they took her breath away.

"Yes." Rosa stepped closer and, daring, laid one hand on Anna's chest, over her heart. "I know this flesh is only an illusion. I know you are an angel in human guise and God has sent you, for what reason I can't fathom, to watch over me. And … such strange clothes you're wearing, Anna! All covered with blood, too." Her happiness made words spill forth that almost surprised her. Wasn't it presumptuous to speak so carelessly to an angel? Still, she was alive, alive because God himself wanted it and commanded his servants to spare her. Perhaps she had the right.

"I suppose I must look out of place," Anna said. Without another word, she changed. The clinging men's garments disappeared, replaced by a white shift like the one Rosa wore. Her feet were bare. Rosa, her hand still over Anna's heart, felt the cloth become coarser under her fingertips. She could sense a heartbeat just like a human's and, despite what she had said, had to remind herself that it was not real, only part of the illusion.

"You're so … perfect," she said. "If I hadn't seen … Your skin is warm, your heart beats. You breathe. You have a scent about you like … smoke."

"Yes. I lived as a human for a long time. I remember the way it feels," Anna said.

"You were human? Why would an angel…?"

Anna's hands rose to cup her face, thumbs light and caressing on her cheeks.

"I know you don't believe this," Anna said, "but you have so many things that we only wish for. I used to envy humans so much, Ruby. I still envy you now."

The words made no sense to her. Envy was a sin and humanity surely too debased to desire. "Ruby," she said, seizing on something safer. "You've always called me that, as if I were a jewel. Why?"

"It's your name," Anna said, explaining nothing.

Rosa didn't have the wherewithal to protest. Not when Anna moved closer, step by step, crowding her until Rosa's back thudded into the wall and Anna was pressed against her and yes, she had thought about this, but only with shame and she had never imagined—never dared—

Anna kissed her. She thought, this must be wrong. It felt nothing like religion when Anna's lips clung to hers; it felt exactly like a woman's fingers on her chin, pulling her mouth open, holding her as if she were the one who might fly away.

She thought, deliriously, a woman who takes up devilish ways and plays a male role in coupling with another woman is most vile in God's sight. But an angel was not a woman. Not flesh, not … physical. How could loving an angel be a sin?

It felt nothing like spiritual love when Anna's hand plucked at the sleeve of her shift, the pads of her fingers leaving their invisible prints on Rosa's collarbone. It felt hot and physical, like another fever raging through her.

"I keep coming back to you," Anna murmured into her neck. She pulled the sleeve down off Rosa's left shoulder, slipped a hand down the front of her dress. Rosa's back arched and she closed her eyes, biting her lip as Anna's thumb traced the curve of her breast.

She remembered paintings of saints in ecstasy, pierced by angelic arrows. This wasn't like dreaming about young ladies in pretty dresses or fresh-faced milkmaids, thoughts to be crushed before they could take root. It was different, it couldn't possibly be—dirty, filthy, like they said. She could think of nothing more pure than Anna's lips.

She could let herself have this.

A lock seemed to spring from her heart and something burst out. With a sense of freedom she'd never had, she dug eager hands into Anna's hair and pulled her up for a kiss.

"Stay with me," she whispered. "I'm yours forever if you stay with me."

Rosa believed her when she said yes. She did stay for a while, long enough for Rosa to stop thinking of her with reverence as ian angel/i and start to see only Anna. It was easy when Anna smiled just like a girl, flicked soapy water at her, or spent hours with her in the Badia, always emerging looking stronger and more awake. Only when one of the other nuns appeared and she turned to find Anna had vanished did she feel a prickle of awe.

The sisters marveled at her devotion, at the hours spent praying in her cell, the liveliness of her illuminations of angels, the ardency of her theological arguments. People began to speak of her in hushed tones, saying she heard voices from Heaven. All the while she kept her secret like a burning coal in her heart and she was happier than she'd ever been.

Then one day a boy came to the abbey with a story. A nearby town had been destroyed by some kind of mysterious catastrophe, the houses flattened and splintered, the people all disappeared. It was unnatural and everyone crossed themselves, made donations to the Church and repeated prayers, looking occasionally and fearfully up at the sky.

With a sense of foreboding, Rosa went to her cell and knelt and called out. Anna didn't come. She stayed awake all that night and still Anna didn't come. She worried, chewing at her fingernails and pacing in helpless frustration. Days passed and she began to grow angry.

The anger fuelled her thoughts. She considered what she actually knew about Anna. They had rarely spoken about angels, but she'd hardly expected to learn Heaven's secrets. Now she wondered. She thought about the word envy and about her mother and the things Anna had said. Her memories whirled, confused and indistinct.

Then the Black Death came to Italy and swept through all the land from Rome to the tiniest hamlet, carrying away souls in untold numbers. Rosa and her sisters in devotion prayed until they had no voice, and then they stopped praying to bury their dead, and then prayed again, silently. No one came. No Anna, no angels, no God, no respite. Only more bodies. Nuns, shepherds, traders, townspeople. Paolina. Filippo.

She wondered if her mother was alive.

Finally, she grew too angry to pray. She tore apart her Bible, sobbing with fury. They had all been abandoned and she had been made a fool of and there had been nothing spiritual about her love, only lies and weak flesh, flesh that could be so easily seduced and so easily cut down by death.

In the darkest part of the night, she wondered if her sinfulness had caused all of this suffering. To lie with an angel—a female angel—must have been a terrible crime after all. If Anna had truly been an angel and not a devil in disguise. But if so, surely only Rosa should have been punished and not all the world.

God was not just.

When the verses and prayers no longer made sense, she cast them off. She was not content to wait for salvation. There could be no forgiveness for what God had allowed to happen. There were other powers in the world, and she made it her business to court them.

***

_I had grown so comfortable. Part of me believed it could last forever, like she'd said. I should have known better: nothing human is allowed to last forever._

_The two hunting me must have found some trace, because they smote a town not far from Fiesole. They didn't really think I was there. It was just a sign. A warning._

_So I flashed my wings at them and led them on a chase far, far in the future. It took a long time to lose them. When I finally had a chance to make my way back to the 14th century, I couldn't find her. The timeline had become so disturbed by angels tearing through it that they must have had miracles for centuries either way. I had to start all over, looking for her soul._

_When I found her, she was doing something dangerous, of course. _

***

Rosa held a sopping wet cloth over her mouth and nose and dashed back into the villa. The smoke still made it hard to see and her eyes watered uncontrollably. She could hear Filippo screaming at her, saying Maddalena, what do you think you're doing? She was glad when she got too far away to make out the words.

Her mother's box was still there in the attic room where the servants slept, with the little portrait the master had commissioned inside. She needed it.

The smoke grew denser and the air hotter as she scrambled up the back stairs. She hadn't been in the house when the fire started, or she would have grabbed it first thing. The flames were in the east wing; she thought she had time. It wouldn't take long after all, just a quick minute to grab the little box and run.

When she got to the attic, she could hear a dull roar below the floorboards. The heat was suffocating. She coughed, blinking streaming eyes and feeling her way across to her bed.

She hadn't made it halfway across the room when the flames came up through the floor. She screamed; the fire was like a wild thing, devouring the house faster than she would have thought possible. She heard an earsplitting crack and knew, deep in her bones, that it was the rafters. The ceiling was about to cave in and even as she turned and ran she knew it was too late.

Then suddenly there was silence, a heavy stillness like in a dream. Rosa turned her head to look.

She saw, for the third time, the strange woman in white. Anna, she remembered the name. Anna stood in the midst of the flames and didn't burn. She reached up a calm hand and caught the falling rafters, holding them up at an angle as if they weighed no more than a needle. Her eyes met Rosa's and she looked … exasperated.

Behind her, Rosa saw the silhouette of tremendous wings, outlined in fire. They flapped and the flames roared, stilled and quieted. The room seemed too small to hold them.

"Go, Ruby!" Anna said in the fire's voice.

Angel, Rosa thought as she bolted. The word filled her with terror and joy. She barely noticed the hands receiving her outside the villa, pulling her away from the collapsing building.

She kept her eyes fixed on the growing fire for a long time, searching for a glimpse of wings.

***

_I didn't get the chance to speak with her. I don't know what I was thinking. I wanted to apologize or explain or at least argue. To talk to her again. Maybe if I found her in her past and told her why I left, she would remember in the future. And not hate me. _

***

Rosa left the villa by moonlight one night and made her angry, clumsy way downhill to where she knew the distant Arno was flowing. She didn't look back, didn't look at anything, and so the patches of shadows among the trees hid the stranger until Rosa was almost upon her. It was the white flash of a dress that tore her out of her rage and made her stop, senses suddenly straining.

"Who's there?" she said.

"Only me," came the soft reply. A scatter of moonlight detached itself from a tree and took the shape of a young woman. Young woman, white dress, red hair, bare feet – Rosa took a skittish step back, dropping the bundle on her shoulder onto the ground. A year's time had not made her forget that odd face.

"I don't know what you are," she said, "but I am one of the Lord's flock and He does not love creatures of evil. I will fight you."

She slipped the kitchen knife she had stolen out of her pocket to prove it. The woman ignored it, coming closer on silent feet.

"Don't be afraid," she said.

"I'm not." Rosa shifted away, keeping a careful distance between them. The stranger mirrored her movements, blocking her chosen path.

Rosa picked up her bundle and brandished the knife. "Maybe you're just a mad wanderer. Or maybe you're a witch or—something else, something of the Devil. But I will kill you if you cross me."

"You won't." The woman seemed calm, but coiled. It wasn't hard to imagine she was mad. She might break into a fit at any moment.

"I'm here to tell you something," she said.

"I'm busy," Rosa said.

The stranger looked at Rosa's bundle and her knife and the footpath they were standing on. "You're running away," she said. "But you'll come back."

"You talk like you know me," Rosa said slowly. "Who are you?"

The woman put a hand to her forehead as if in pain. "My name is Anna," she said, very quietly.

That was no answer. But this Anna seemed distracted now, a little lost and less threatening. Rosa started to edge around her. She didn't want to talk to madwomen, she wanted to be far away before the servants rose and someone noticed she had gone.

"No, wait—" Anna said, making a grab for her arm.

She lashed out without thinking and heard a hiss as her knife connected with flesh. Anna stumbled backwards and fell. She landed in a beam of moonlight, bright as day, and so Rosa saw with perfect clarity how the shallow wound on her upper arm closed up almost instantly. Only a thin streak of blood staining her dress remained as evidence that there had been a cut at all.

"You …" Rosa said. "I …" Her hands shook and it was hard to keep her grip on the knife. "Witchcraft?"

Anna laughed, still sprawled on the forest floor.

"Oh, Ruby," she said. "If only I could tell you. If only you would believe me. We never did manage to trust each other at the right time."

"Ruby?"

"I'm not a witch," Anna said. "You'll find out when you see me again." She stood up and she didn't look mad now. The moonlight shone on her but it was almost as if she was the source of the light and the whole forest was illuminated through her. Maybe it was, Rosa thought. Anna clearly wasn't human.

"I don't think I want to see you again," Rosa said.

"You will. Now I have something to tell you. I know you're going to look for your mother. You won't find her." She continued, ignoring Rosa's confused protests. "She's not in Florence. Your father sent her much further away. You'll come back here and when you do, I want you to remember Sister Paolina at the abbey. She'll help you."

"I'm not coming back," Rosa said fiercely. "And I will find her. You don't know—you can't know the future. Only God knows what will be. And He is kind."

Anna only gave her a long, sad look. Then she vanished, there one moment and simply gone the next.

***

_I was surprised at how much it hurt. She didn't know me at all. She attacked me._

_I can only imagine how she felt when I first met her, in all ignorance of what was to come, had already come._

_And of course, I realized she would never understand or believe anything I told her about the future, any more than I'd understood what she had said to me about mine. We had tied ourselves up in knots._

_I wanted to see her happy again. So I took one more trip, before everything, before all the heartbreak and disappointment. She must have been happy once, before Heaven and Hell came into her life. _

***

They were bringing the wool down to Florence. The cart was already indistinct in the gray of early morning, wheels creaking as it rolled reluctantly over ruts and bumps. Rosa strained her eyes, watching from the roadside as a slender figure ghosted alongside the cart on its way downhill, turning occasionally to look back. It was too dark to make out the woman's features, and by the time a slice of the sun appeared above the horizon, she and the wool cart appeared nothing more than a darker spot in the morning shadow of the hill.

Rosa turned away. She wasn't one to linger, especially when she knew perfectly well her mother was coming back. There were chores to be done at the villa and she wanted to be home before the morning was gone.

As she climbed the slope into the small heart of the town, a boy fell in beside her. She knew him: Filippo, the son of a shepherd who lived an hour's walk into the hills. He was older than she was, perhaps fifteen, but friendly enough to talk to a younger child, even a girl. He carried a coarse bag slung over his shoulder; he was probably on an errand to the blacksmith's or the baker's.

"She's gone, then?" he said genially.

"Only for a while," Rosa said. "She's to help at the house of one of the master's lady relatives." She always referred to the owner of the villa as 'the master,' as she'd been taught never to call him 'father.'

"That's what they're saying?"

She shot him a dark glance from the corner of her eye and turned her head away, stung by a sudden dislike.

"That's the truth of the matter."

Filippo laughed. "Don't be angry with me, Maddalena, Rosa Maddalena! I'm sure you're right. She's your mother, who would know her better than you?"

The nickname made her raise her chin a little in stubborn rejection, but she knew he was only teasing. People nicknamed her Maddalena as a joke for her red hair, except when they were angry with her; then they muttered under their breaths, calling her unnaturally willful and stubborn.

They came to the town square, the Duomo casting its familiar, elegant shadow over the morning activities. Shutters were already open on the few shops—the baker had no doubt been up for hours—and someone bustled into a side door of the cathedral as Rosa skirted it. The villa was on the far side of town. Filippo stayed by her side; he was going to the blacksmith's, then.

"The master would never let my mother stay away for long," she said. "He can barely live without her."

"Ah, but it seems she could live without him," Filippo said with a wink whose meaning she didn't understand, though she knew he meant something rude by it.

She had the sudden feeling he knew something she didn't. It was a feeling she hated, if only because it was so familiar. Sometimes it seemed like people never told her anything.

"I wish you'd been sent away instead of her," she said, with a tiny stab of pleasure at the annoyed look on his face.

"As if you could stand to be without me, my Maddalena."

His presence was becoming more irritating than enjoyable. She quickened her pace. "Now you're just being silly," she said as she rounded the southeast corner of the Duomo. The new sunlight fell brightly on the eastern side of the square here, warming the stone and momentarily blinding her. She stopped, and felt Filippo doing the same behind her.

There was a stranger, a woman, by the back wall of the Duomo. Rosa blinked until she came into focus: a woman in a filthy white dress, stained with what looked like dried blood and soot. She had red hair and dirty, bare feet. She was leaning one hand against the wall of the cathedral and her eyes were fixed on the spot were Rosa stood, as if she had known someone was going to appear.

People frequently passed through Fiesole on their way to Florence, but this was the strangest vagabond Rosa had ever seen. She gave the woman a wide berth, but couldn't help staring a little as she passed by. She'd never seen anyone else with red hair before.

The woman stared right back, so intently that Rosa's steps slowed in confusion.

"Rosa, let's go," Filippo said. His voice was uncertain. Rosa ignored him and a moment later she heard him hurry away.

The stranger's face was young but her eyes were old, ancient, ageless, and something in the way they gazed at Rosa made her shiver, not with fear of death but another kind of fear she couldn't name. They rooted her to the spot. There was something not quite human about them and Rosa thought of stories she had heard about ghosts and witches and demons taking the shape of people.

Tears welled up in the woman's eyes and spilled over, running down her cheeks. She looked at Rosa as if they knew each other. That was why her eyes seemed so eerie, Rosa thought.

The bells began to ring and Rosa started so violently she almost stumbled over her own feet. She half-expected the woman in white to disappear at the holy chimes, but no, she took a step closer instead.

When Rosa turned and ran, she thought she heard the sound of wings behind her.

***

_And then after all that, you came along and stuck a knife in her. Does that seem right to you, Dean Winchester? You had no idea who she was. I can't pretend I did either, after all those centuries in Hell. Even if she was different from other demons, she was still … a demon._

_I don't know if I helped her. Part of me wants to believe she held on to a bit of her humanity because of what we had together, but maybe that's wishful thinking. More likely she was just that stubborn._

_I do know she helped me. When my brothers and sisters caught up with me at last, they weren't gentle. Heaven may have a better reputation than Hell, but its torments can be just as terrible. I clung to the thought of her. I resisted the way I knew she would have._

_When I escaped, everything on Earth looked different. My body didn't feel like me; sensations that should have been familiar seemed foreign. I think they took something from me—memories and feelings, maybe more. I still remembered Ruby, though. It must have been the same for her when she clawed her way up from Hell: a half-alien world and a body not her own._

_It became clear to me that Heaven and Hell ruin everything they touch. They can burn through all of humanity just as easily as through two people, and they will. No cost is too high to prevent that. I know you could never do it, Dean, so I will. Lucifer's vessel has to die. For what it's worth, I wish there was another way._

_Now wake up._


End file.
